Low-loss photonic crystal waveguide having large core radius

ABSTRACT

An optical waveguide including: a dielectric core region extending along a waveguide axis; and a dielectric confinement region surrounding the core about the waveguide axis, the confinement region comprising a photonic crystal structure having a photonic band gap, wherein during operation the confinement region guides EM radiation in at least a first range of frequencies to propagate along the waveguide axis, wherein the core has an average refractive index smaller than about 1.3 for a frequency in the first range of frequencies, and wherein the core a diameter in a range between about 4 λ and 80 λ, wherein λ is a wavelength corresponding to a central frequency in the first frequency range.

CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATIONS

This application claims priority to U.S. provisional patent applications60/264,201 filed Jan. 25, 2001 and 60/337,603 filed Nov. 8, 2001, thecontents of which are incorporated herein by reference.

BACKGROUND

This invention relates to the field of dielectric optical waveguides andoptical telecommunications.

Optical waveguides guide optical signals to propagate along a preferredpath or paths. Accordingly, they can be used to carry optical signalinformation between different locations and thus they form the basis ofoptical telecommunication networks. The most prevalent type of opticalwaveguide is an optical fiber based on index guiding. Such fibersinclude a core region extending along a waveguide axis and a claddingregion surrounding the core about the waveguide axis and having arefractive index less than that of the core region. Because of theindex-contrast, optical rays propagating substantially along thewaveguide axis in the higher-index core can undergo total internalreflection (TIR) from the core-cladding interface. As a result, theoptical fiber guides one or more modes of electromagnetic (EM) radiationto propagate in the core along the waveguide axis. The number of suchguided modes increases with core diameter. Notably, the index-guidingmechanism precludes the presence of any cladding modes lying below thelowest-frequency guided mode. Almost all index-guided optical fibers inuse commercially are silica-based in which one or both of the core andcladding are doped with impurities to produce the index contrast andgenerate the core-cladding interface. For example, commonly used silicaoptical fibers have indices of about 1.45 and index contrasts of up toabout 2-3% for wavelengths in the range of 1.5 microns.

Signals traveling down an optical fiber slowly attenuate, necessitatingperiodic amplification and/or regeneration, typically every 50-100 km.Such amplifiers are costly, and are especially inconvenient in submarinecables where space, power sources, and maintenance are problematic.Losses for silica-based optical fibers have been driven down to about0.2 dB/km, at which point they become limited by the Rayleigh scatteringprocesses. Rayleigh scattering results from microscopic interactions ofthe light with the medium at a molecular scale and is proportional toω⁴ρ, where 107 is the light frequency and ρ is the material density,along with some other constants of the material.

In addition to loss, signals propagating along an optical fiber may alsoundergo nonlinear interactions. In an ideal linear material, light doesnot interact with itself—this is what allows a fiber to carry multiplecommunications channels simultaneously in separate wavelengths(wavelength-division multiplexing, or WDM), without interactions orcrosstalk. Any real optical medium (even vacuum), however, possessessome nonlinear properties. Although the nonlinearities of silica andother common materials are weak, they become significant when light ispropagated over long distances (hundreds or thousands of kilometers) orwith high powers. Such nonlinear properties have many undesirableeffects including: self/cross phase modulation (SPM/XPM), which cancause increased pulse broadening and limit bitrates; and a four-wavemixing (FWM) and stimulated Raman/Brillouin scattering (SRS/SBS), whichinduce crosstalk between different wavelength channels and can limit thenumber of achievable channels for WDM. Such nonlinearities are aphysical property of the material in the waveguide and typically scalewith the density of the waveguide core.

Typically, optical fibers used for long-distance communications have acore small enough to support only one fundamental mode in a desiredfrequency range, and therefore called “single-mode” fibers. Single modeoperation is necessary to limit signal degradation caused by modaldispersion, which occurs when a signal can couple to multiple guidedmodes having different speeds. Nonetheless, the name “single-mode” fiberis something of a misnomer. Actually, single-mode fibers support twooptical modes, consisting of the two orthogonal polarizations of lightin the fiber. The existence and similarity of these two modes is thesource of a problem known as polarization-mode dispersion (PMD). Anideal fiber would possess perfect rotational symmetry about its axis, inwhich case the two modes would behave identically (they are“degenerate”) and cause no difficulties. In practice, however, realfibers have some acircularity when they are manufactured, and inaddition there are environmental stresses that break the symmetry. Thishas two effects, both of which occur in a random and unpredictablefashion along the fiber: first, the polarization of light rotates as itpropagates down the fiber; and second, the two polarizations travel atdifferent speeds. Thus, any transmitted signal will consist of randomlyvarying polarizations which travel at randomly varying speeds, resultingin PMD: pulses spread out over time, and will eventually overlap unlessbit rate and/or distance is limited. There are also other deleteriouseffects, such as polarization-dependent loss. Although there are otherguided modes that have full circular symmetry, and thus are truly“singlet” modes, such modes are not the fundamental modes and are onlypossible with a core large enough to support multiple modes. Inconventional optical fibers, however, the PMD effects associated withthe fundamental mode of a small core supporting only a “single-mode” arefar preferable to the effects of modal dispersion in a larger coremulti-mode fiber.

Another problem with directing optical signals along an opticalwaveguide is the presence of chromatic or group-velocity dispersion inthat waveguide. Such dispersion is a measure of the degree to whichdifferent frequencies of the guided radiation propagate at differentspeeds (i.e., group velocities) along the waveguide axis. Because anyoptical pulse includes a range of frequencies, dispersion causes anoptical pulse to spread in time as its different frequency componentstravel at different speeds. With such spreading, neighboring pulses or“bits” in an optical signal may begin to overlap and thereby degradesignal detection. Thus, absent compensation, dispersion over an opticaltransmission length places an upper limit on the bit-rate or bandwidthof an optical signal.

Chromatic dispersion includes two contributions: material dispersion andwaveguide dispersion. Material dispersion comes from thefrequency-dependence of the refractive index of the materialconstituents of the optical waveguide. Waveguide dispersion comes fromfrequency-dependent changes in the spatial distribution of a guidedmode. As the spatial distribution of a guided modes changes, it sampledifferent regions of the waveguide, and therefore “sees” a change in theaverage index of the waveguide that effectively changes its groupvelocity. In conventional silica optical fibers, material dispersion andwaveguide dispersion cancel each other out at approximately 1310 nmproducing a point of zero dispersion. Silica optical fibers have alsobeen modified to move the zero dispersion point to around 1550 nm, whichcorresponds to a minimum in material absorption for silica.

Unfortunately, while operating at zero dispersion minimizes pulsespreading, it also enhances nonlinear interactions in the optical fibersuch as four wave mixing (FWM) because different frequencies remainphase-matched over large distances. This is particularly problematic inwavelength-division multiplexing (WDM) systems where multiple signalsare carried at different wavelengths in a common optical fiber. In suchWDM systems, FWM introduces cross talk between the different wavelengthchannels as described above. To address this problem, WDM systemstransmit signals through optical fibers that introduce a sufficientdispersion to minimize cross-phase modulation, and thereafter transmitsthe signals through a “dispersion compensating fiber” (DCF), to cancelthe original dispersion and minimize pulse spreading in the compensatedsignal. Unfortunately, aggregate interactions between the dispersion andother nonlinear processes such as self-phase modulation can complicatedispersion compensation.

Another type of waveguide fiber, one that is not based on TIRindex-guiding, is a Bragg fiber, which includes multiple dielectriclayers surrounding a core about a waveguide axis. The multiple layersform a cylindrical mirror that confines light to the core over a rangeof frequencies. The multiple layers form what is known as a photoniccrystal, and the Bragg fiber is an example of a photonic crystal fiber.Some researchers have commented that Bragg fibers are not feasible forlong distance optical transmission (see N. J. Doran and K. J. Blow, J.of Lightwave Tech., LT-1:588, 1983).

SUMMARY

The invention features a photonic crystal fiber having propertiesparticularly suitable for use in optical transmission. In particular,the photonic crystal fibers described herein have low losses, exhibitsmall nonlinear effects, and can effectively operate in a non-degeneratesingle mode.

The inventors have recognized that designing a photonic crystal fiber(such as a Bragg fiber) with a large core radius (e.g., larger thanabout twice the wavelength of the guided radiation) leads to manydesirable properties. For example, the inventors have determined thatthe fraction of energy outside of the core for a guided mode in aphotonic crystal fiber scales inversely with the cube of the coreradius. Accordingly, radiation and dissipation losses associated withthe dielectric confinement layers can be made very small by increasingthe core radius. Moreover, because the confinement mechanism is notbased on total internal reflection (TIR), the core material is notlimited to a material having a relatively high index. Thus, the corematerial can be selected to minimize losses and nonlinearities. Forexample, the fiber may have a hollow core. Furthermore, the inventorshave discovered that confinement in the core is further improved byselecting materials for the layers (or regions) outside the core to havea large contrast in refractive index. Such contrasts are possiblebecause the large core radius makes dissipation by the outside layers(or regions) less of an issue and thus the constituent materials of theoutside layers (or regions) can be selected more on the basis ofproviding the desired index contrast, than on absorption losses.

The inventors have further recognized that although the large core leadsto multiple guided modes, the multiple modes have attenuation lossesthat differ significantly from one another. The differential lossesamong the multiple modes (i.e., modal filtering) rapidly lead tosingle-mode operation for modest transmission lengths, and thus modaldispersion is avoided. Moreover, the lowest-loss mode can be selected tobe non-degenerate, which eliminates effects such as polarization-modedispersion. Nonetheless, the inventors have also recognized that thereis an upper limit on the core size. When the core size is too large(e.g., larger than about forty times the wavelength of the guidedradiation), the modes become closely spaced, and thus perturbations moreeasily cause coupling between different modes. Also, the inventors haverecognized that in Bragg fibers, the TE₀₁ mode has a node near thecore/cladding interface, which leads to a reduction in losses andnonlinear effects.

We will now summarize different aspects, features, and advantages of theinvention.

In general, in one aspect, the invention features an optical waveguideincluding: (i) a dielectric core region extending along a waveguideaxis; and (ii) a dielectric confinement region surrounding the coreabout the waveguide axis, the confinement region including a photoniccrystal structure having a photonic band gap, wherein during operationthe confinement region guides EM radiation in at least a first range offrequencies to propagate along the waveguide axis. The core has anaverage refractive index smaller than about 1.3 for a frequency in thefirst range of frequencies, the core has a diameter in a range betweenabout 4 λ and 80 λ, wherein λ is a wavelength corresponding to a centralfrequency in the first frequency range, and the dielectric confinementregion extends transversely from the core for at least a distance ofabout 6 λ.

In general, in another aspect, the invention features an opticalwaveguide including: (i) a dielectric core region extending along awaveguide axis; and (ii) a dielectric confinement region surrounding thecore about the waveguide axis. The confinement region has an averageindex greater than that of the core, and during operation theconfinement region guides EM radiation in at least a first range offrequencies to propagate along the waveguide axis. The core has anaverage refractive index smaller than about 1.3 for a frequency in thefirst range of frequencies, the core has a diameter in a range betweenabout 4 λ and 80 λ, wherein λ is a wavelength corresponding to a centralfrequency in the first frequency range, and the dielectric confinementregion extends transversely from the core for at least a distance ofabout 6 λ.

In general, in another aspect, the invention features an opticalwaveguide including: (i) a dielectric core region extending along awaveguide axis; and (ii) a dielectric confinement region surrounding thecore about the waveguide axis. The confinement region includesalternating layers of at least two dielectric two materials surroundingthe core about the waveguide axis, the two dielectric materials havingrefractive indices that differ by at least 10%, and wherein duringoperation the confinement region guides EM radiation in at least a firstrange of frequencies to propagate along the waveguide axis. The core hasan average refractive index smaller than about 1.3 for a frequency inthe first range of frequencies, the core a diameter in a range betweenabout 4 λ and 80 λ, wherein λ is a wavelength corresponding to a centralfrequency in the first frequency range, and the dielectric confinementregion extends transversely from the core for at least a distance ofabout 6 λ.

In general, in another aspect, the invention features an opticalwaveguide including: (i) a dielectric core region extending along awaveguide axis; and (ii) a dielectric confinement region surrounding thecore about the waveguide axis. The confinement region includes at least12 pairs of alternating layers of dielectric material having differentrefractive indices, wherein the layers are sufficient to guide EMradiation in at least a first range of frequencies to propagate alongthe waveguide axis. The refractive indices of the alternating layersdiffer by at least 10% for a frequency in the first range offrequencies. At least some of the pairs of alternating layers have atotal thickness equal to about a, and the core has a diameter in a rangebetween about 10 a and 100 a. In some embodiments, the core diameter isin a range between 20 a and 80 a.

In another aspect, the invention features an optical waveguideincluding: (i) a dielectric core region extending along a waveguideaxis; and (ii) a dielectric confinement region surrounding the coreabout the waveguide axis. The confinement region guides EM radiation inat least a first range of frequencies to propagate along the waveguideaxis. The core has an average refractive index smaller than about 1.3for a frequency in the first range of frequencies, and the core has adiameter in a range between about 5 microns and 170 microns.

In general, in another aspect, the invention features an opticalwaveguide including: (i) a dielectric core region extending along awaveguide axis; and (ii) a dielectric confinement region surrounding thecore about the waveguide axis. The confinement region includes at leasttwo dielectric materials forming a photonic crystal structure having aphotonic band gap, the dielectric materials sufficient to guide EMradiation in at least a first range of frequencies to propagate alongthe waveguide axis. The refractive indices of the dielectric materialsin the confinement region differ by at least 10% for a frequency in thefirst range of frequencies, and the core has a diameter in a rangebetween about 5 microns and 170 microns.

Embodiments of any of the waveguides described above may include any ofthe following features.

The dielectric confinement region may extend transversely from the corefor at least a distance of about 8 λ, about 10 λ, or about 12 λ. Theaverage refractive index of the core may smaller than about 1.3, smallerthan about 1.2, or smaller than about 1.1 for a frequency in the firstrange of frequencies. The core may include a gas.

The diameter of the core may be in a range have a lower limit of any of4 λ, 6 λ, 8 λ, or 10 λ and an upper limit of any of 100 λ, 80 λ, 60 λ,or 40 λ, wherein λ is a wavelength corresponding to a central frequencyin the first range of frequencies.

The diameter of the core may be in a range have a lower limit of any of5 microns, 7 microns, 10 microns, and 12 microns and an upper limit ofany of 170 microns, 120 microns, and 100 microns, and 50 microns.

The first range of frequencies may correspond to wavelengths in therange of about 1.2 microns to 1.7 microns. Alternatively, the firstrange of frequencies may correspond to wavelengths in the range of about0.7 microns to 0.9 microns. The ratio of the bandwidth of the firstrange of frequencies and the central frequency and may be at least about10%.

The waveguide axis may be substantially straight or it may include oneor more bends. The core may have a circular cross-section, a hexagonalcross-section, or a rectangular cross-section.

The confinement region may guide at least one mode to propagate alongthe waveguide axis with radiative losses less than 0.1 dB/km, or evenless than 0.01 dB/km for a frequency in the first range of frequencies.For example, the mode may be a TE mode (e.g., TE₀₁). The waveguide maysupport a mode in which at least 99% of the average energy of thepropagating EM radiation is in the core for a frequency in the firstrange of frequencies.

The confinement region may include at least two dielectric materialshaving different refractive indices. The ratio of the refractive indexof the higher index dielectric material to that of the lower indexdielectric material may be greater than 1.1, greater than 1.5, orgreater than 2. For example, the lower-index dielectric material mayinclude a polymer or a glass, and the higher-index dielectric materialmay include germanium, tellurium, or a chalcogenide glass.

The photonic bandgap may be an omnidirectional photonic bandgap. Thephotonic bandgap may be sufficient to cause EM radiation that isincident on the confinement region from the core in the first frequencyrange and with any polarization to have a reflectivity for a planargeometry that is greater than 95% for angles of incidence ranging from0° to at least 80°. The photonic crystal may be a a one-dimensionalphotonic crystal or a two-dimensional photonic crystal.

The confinement region may include alternating layers of the twodielectric material surrounding the core about the waveguide axis. Forexample, the refractive indices and thicknesses of at least some of thealternating dielectric layers substantially satisfy the followingequality:${\frac{d_{hi}}{d_{lo}} = \frac{\sqrt{n_{lo}^{2} - 1}}{\sqrt{n_{hi}^{2} - 1}}},$

where d_(hi) and d_(lo) are the thicknesses of adjacent higher-index andlower-index layers, respectively, and n_(hl) and n_(lo) are therefractive indices of the adjacent higher-index and lower-index layers,respectively. The confinement region may include at least 12 pairs ofthe alternating layers. The waveguide may support at least one modepropagating along the waveguide axis for which the confinement regionincludes a sufficient number of pairs of alternating layers to limitradiative losses of the mode to less than 0.1 dB/km or even less than0.01 dB/km for a frequency in the first range of frequencies.

At least a first end of the waveguide may include a coupling segmentover which the refractive index cross-section is continuously varied toalter the field profile of the working mode. Furthermore, there may be asecond waveguide coupled to the first mentioned waveguide, wherein thecross-section of the second waveguide adjacent the first waveguideincludes regions of doped silicon located to improve coupling of theworking mode into the second waveguide. Alternatively, or in addition,the cross-section of the second waveguide adjacent the first waveguidemay include a hollow ring contacting the dispersion tailoring region ofthe first waveguide to thereby improve coupling of the working mode intothe second waveguide.

In another aspect, the invention features an optical telecommunicationssystem including: (i) a transmitter generating an optical signal; and(ii) any of the optical waveguides described above coupled at one end tothe transmitter to carry the optical signal, wherein the optical signalis at a frequency in the first frequency range. The optical waveguidemay have a length greater than 30 km, greater than 200 km, or greaterthan 500 km.

The system may further include an optical receiver coupled to the otherend of the optical waveguide to detect the optical signal, an opticalamplifier coupled to the other end of the optical waveguide to amplifythe optical signal, an optical regenerator coupled to the other end ofthe optical waveguide to regenerate the optical signal as an electricalsignal, and/or a dispersion compensation module coupled to the other endof the optical waveguide to introduce dispersion to the optical signalthat substantially cancels dispersion caused by the optical waveguide.The optical signal may be at a wavelength in the range of about 1.2microns to about 1.7 microns or in the range of about 0.7 microns toabout 0.9 microns. Furthermore, the transmitter may generate multiplesignals at different wavelengths, and wherein the different wavelengthscorrespond to frequencies in the first frequency range.

In general, in another aspect, the invention features a method ofdesigning a photonic crystal optical waveguide including a dielectriccore region extending along a waveguide axis and a dielectricconfinement region surrounding the core about the waveguide axis,wherein the confinement region is configured to guide EM radiation in atleast a first range of frequencies to propagate along the waveguide axisand wherein the core has an average refractive index smaller than about1.3 for a frequency in the first range of frequencies. The methodincludes selecting a diameter for the core based on one or more designcriteria for the guided EM radiation including mode separation,group-velocity dispersion, radiative losses, absorption losses, andcladding nonlinearity suppression. For example, the diameter for thecore may be based on at least two of the design criteria. In particular,an upper limit for the diameter of the core may be selected based on themode separation, and a lower limit for the diameter may be selectedbased on at least one of the group-velocity dispersion, the radiativelosses, the absorption losses, and the cladding nonlinearitysuppression. Furthermore, the confinement region may include at leasttwo dielectric materials having different refractive, and the method mayfurther include selecting an index contrast for the different refractiveindices based on at least one of the design criteria including theradiative losses, the absorption losses, and the cladding nonlinearitysuppression.

Unless otherwise defined, all technical and scientific terms used hereinhave the same meaning as commonly understood by one of ordinary skill inthe art to which this invention belongs. Although methods and materialssimilar or equivalent to those described herein can be used in thepractice or testing of the present invention, suitable methods andmaterials are described below. All publications, patent applications,patents, and other references mentioned herein are incorporated byreference in their entirety. In case of conflict, the presentspecification, including definitions, will control. In addition, thematerials, methods, and examples are illustrative only and not intendedto be limiting.

Additional features, objects, and advantages of the invention will beapparent from the following detailed description and drawings, and fromthe claims.

DESCRIPTION OF DRAWINGS

The invention will now be further described merely by way of examplewith reference to the accompanying drawings in which:

FIG. 1 is a schematic diagram of the cross-section of a photonic crystalwaveguide fiber 100.

FIG. 2 are schematic diagrams of the cross-sections of a Bragg fiberwaveguide (left panel) and a hollow metallic waveguide (right panel).

FIG. 3 are photonic band diagrams for a planar Bragg mirror (left panel)and a hollow metallic waveguide (right panel).

FIG. 4 is a photonic band diagram graph of a Bragg fiber.

FIG. 5 are plots of the TE₀₁ (left panel) and EH₁₁ (right panel) fielddistributions.

FIG. 6 is a graph of radiation leakage for modes of a large core (R=30a), 17-layer hollow Bragg fiber.

FIG. 7 is a graph of group velocity (chromatic) dispersion for the TE₀₁mode of the large core Bragg fiber.

FIG. 8 is a graph of absorption losses from the cladding material formodes of the large core Bragg fiber.

FIG. 9 is a graph of the cladding nonlinearity suppression for the TE₀₁mode of the large core Bragg fiber.

FIG. 10 is a graph showing the scaling properties of absorption andnonlinearities with respect to core radius in a Bragg fiber.

FIG. 11 is a schematic diagram of an optical telecommunication systemthat implements large core photonic crystal waveguide fibers describedherein.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION

The invention features a photonic crystal fiber waveguide 100 havingsmall attenuation rates, exhibiting small nonlinearities, and providingeffectively single-mode operation.

Basic Structure

The cross-section of waveguide 100 is shown in FIG. 1 and includes adielectric core 110 extending along a waveguide axis and a dielectricconfinement region 120 surrounding the core. In the embodiment of FIG.1, confinement region 120 is shown to include alternating layers 122 and124 of dielectric materials having different refractive indices. One setof layers, e.g., layers 122, define a high-index set of layers having anindex n_(hi) and a thickness d_(hi), and the other set of layers, e.g.,layers 124, define a low-index set of layers having an index n_(lo) anda thickness d_(lo), where n_(hi)>n_(lo). For convenience only a few ofthe dielectric confinement layers are shown in FIG. 1. In practice,confinement region 120 may include many more layers (e.g., twenty ormore layers). Waveguide 100 may further include an additional structuralcladding layer 140 surrounding the confinement region 120 to providestructural support to the waveguide as a whole. Because structural layer140 does not contribute substantially to the optical properties (e.g.,radiative losses and dispersion) of the waveguide, we do not discuss itfurther.

To simplify numerical calculations in the sections that follow, weassume a circular cross-section for fiber waveguide 100, with core 110having a circular cross-section and region 120 (and layers therein)having an annular cross-section. In other embodiments, however, thewaveguide and its constituent regions may have different geometriccross-section such as a rectangular or a hexagonal cross-section.Furthermore, as mentioned below, core and confinement regions 110 and120 may comprise multiple dielectric materials having differentrefractive indices. In such cases, we may refer to an “averagerefractive index” of a given region, which refers to the sum of theweighted indices for the constituents of the region, where each index isweighted by the fractional area in the region of its constituent. Theboundary between region 110 and 120, however, is defined by a change inindex. The change may be caused by the interface of two differentdielectric materials or by different dopant concentrations in the samedielectric material (e.g., different dopant concentrations in silica).

Dielectric confinement region 120 guides EM radiation in a first rangeof frequencies to propagate in dielectric core 110 along the waveguideaxis. The confinement mechanism is based on a photonic crystal structurein region 120 that forms a bandgap including the first range offrequencies. Because the confinement mechanism is not index-guiding, itis not necessary for the core to have a higher index than that of theportion of the confinement region immediately adjacent the core. To thecontrary, core 110 may have a lower average index than that ofconfinement region 120. For example, core 110 may be air or vacuum. Insuch a case, EM radiation guided in the core will have much smallerlosses and much smaller nonlinear interactions than EM radiation guidedin a silica core, reflecting the smaller absorption and nonlinearinteraction constants of many gases relative to silica or other suchsolid material. In additional embodiments, for example, core 110 mayinclude a porous dielectric material to provide some structural supportfor the surrounding confinement region while still defining a core thatis largely air. Accordingly, core 110 need not have a uniform indexprofile.

The alternating layers 122 and 124 of confinement region 120 form whatis known as a Bragg fiber. The alternating layers are analogous to thealternating layers of a planar dielectric stack reflector (which is alsoknown as a Bragg mirror). The annular layers of confinement region 120and the alternating planar layers of a dielectric stack reflector areboth examples of a photonic crystal structure. Photonic crystalstructures are described generally in Photonic Crystals by John D.Joannopoulos et al. (Princeton University Press, Princeton N.J., 1995).

As used herein, a photonic crystal is a dielectric structure with arefractive index modulation that produces a photonic bandgap in thephotonic crystal. A photonic bandgap, as used herein, is a range offrequencies in which there are no accessible extended (i.e.,propagating, non-localized) states in the dielectric structure.Typically the structure is a periodic dielectric structure, but it mayalso include, e.g., more complex “quasi-crystals.” The bandgap can beused to confine, guide, and/or localize light by combining the photoniccrystal with “defect” regions that deviate from the bandgap structure.Moreover, there are accessible extended states for frequencies bothbelow and above the gap, allowing light to be confined even inlower-index regions (in contrast to index-guided TIR structures). Theterm “accessible” states means those states with which coupling is notalready forbidden by some symmetry or conservation law of the system.For example, in two-dimensional systems, polarization is conserved, soonly states of a similar polarization need to be excluded from thebandgap. In a waveguide with uniform cross-section (such as a typicalfiber), the wavevector β is conserved, so only states with a given βneed to excluded from the bandgap to support photonic crystal guidedmodes. Moreover, in a waveguide with cylindrical symmetry, the “angularmomentum” index m is conserved, so only modes with the same m need to beexcluded from the bandgap. In short, for high-symmetry systems therequirements for photonic bandgaps are considerably relaxed compared to“complete” bandgaps in which all states, regardless of symmetry, areexcluded.

Accordingly, the dielectric stack reflector is highly reflective in thephotonic bandgap because EM radiation cannot propagate through thestack. Similarly, the annular layers in confinement region 220 provideconfinement because they are highly reflective for incident rays in thebandgap. Strictly speaking, a photonic crystal is only completelyreflective in the bandgap when the index modulation in the photoniccrystal has an infinite extent. Otherwise, incident radiation can“tunnel” through the photonic crystal via an evanescent mode thatcouples propagating modes on either side of the photonic crystal. Inpractice, however, the rate of such tunneling decreases exponentiallywith photonic crystal thickness (e.g., the number of alternatinglayers). It also decreases with the magnitude of the index contrast inthe confinement region.

Furthermore, a photonic bandgap may extend over only a relatively smallregion of propagation vectors. For example, a dielectric stack may behighly reflective for a normally incident ray and yet only partiallyreflective for an obliquely incident ray. A “complete photonic bandgap”is a bandgap that extends over all possible wavevectors and allpolarizations. Generally, a complete photonic bandgap is only associatedwith a photonic crystal having index modulations along three dimensions.However, in the context of EM radiation incident on a photonic crystalfrom an adjacent dielectric material, we can also define an“omnidirectional photonic bandgap,” which is a photonic bandgap for allpossible wavevectors and polarizations for which the adjacent dielectricmaterial supports propagating EM modes. Equivalently, an omnidirectionalphotonic bandgap can be defined as a photonic band gap for all EM modesabove the light line, wherein the light line defines the lowestfrequency propagating mode supported by the material adjacent thephotonic crystal. For example, in air the light line is approximatelygiven by ω=cβ, where ω is the angular frequency of the radiation, β isthe wavevector, and c is the speed of light. A description of anomnidirectional planar reflector is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No.6,130,780, the contents of which are incorporated herein by reference.Furthermore, the use of alternating dielectric layers to provideomnidirectional reflection (in a planar limit) for a cylindricalwaveguide geometry is disclosed in Published PCT application WO00/22466, the contents of which are incorporated herein by reference.

When alternating layers 122 and 124 in confinement region 120 give riseto an omnidirectional bandgap with respect to core 110, the guided modesare strongly confined because, in principle, any EM radiation incidenton the confinement region from the core is completely reflected.However, such complete reflection only occurs when there are an infinitenumber of layers. For a finite number of layers (e.g., about 20 layers),an omnidirectional photonic bandgap may correspond to a reflectivity ina planar geometry of at least 95% for all angles of incidence rangingfrom 0° to 80° and for all polarizations of EM radiation havingfrequency in the omnidirectional bandgap. Furthermore, even whenwaveguide 100 has a confinement region with a bandgap that is notomnidirectional, it may still support a strongly guided mode, e.g., amode with radiation losses of less than 0.1 dB/km for a range offrequencies in the bandgap. Generally, whether or not the bandgap isomnidirectional will depend on the size of the bandgap produced by thealternating layer (which generally scales with index contrast of the twolayers) and the lowest-index constituent of the photonic crystal.

In additional embodiments, the dielectric confinement region may includephotonic crystal structures different from a multilayer Braggconfiguration. For example, rather than the Bragg configuration, whichis an example of a one-dimensionally periodic photonic crystal (in theplanar limit), the confinement region may be selected to form, forexample, a two-dimensionally periodic photonic crystal (in the planarlimit), such as an index modulation corresponding to a honeycombstructure. See, for example, R. F. Cregan et al., Science 285:1537-1539,1999. Furthermore, even in a Bragg-like configuration, the high-indexlayers may vary in index and thickness, and/or the low-index layers mayvary in index and thickness. In general, the confinement region may bebased on any index modulation that creates a photonic bandgap.

The multilayer waveguides may be fabricated using multilayer co-drawingtechniques, co-extrusion techniques, or deposition techniques. Suitablehigh-index materials may include chalcogenide glasses such as binary andternary glass systems, heavy metal oxide glasses, amorphous alloys, andhigh-index doped polymers. Suitable low-index materials may includeoxide glasses such as borosilicate glasses, halide glasses, and poymerssuch as polystyrene. In addition, low-index regions may be fabricated byusing hollow structural support materials, such as silica spheres orhollow fibers, to separate high-index layers or regions.

In general, computational methods known in the art can be used todetermine the modal properties of the dielectric waveguides describedherein. Furthermore, iterative calculations may be used to determinewaveguide specifications that optimize selected waveguide properties. Weoutline below some of the basic physics that underlie such calculations.In particular, the EM modes supported by a structure can be solvednumerically according to Maxwell's equations and the boundary conditionsfor the structure. Furthermore, for an all-dielectric, isotropicstructure, Maxwell's equations can be reduced to: $\begin{matrix}{{\nabla{\times \left( {\frac{1}{ɛ(r)}{\nabla{\times {H(r)}}}} \right)}} = {\left( \frac{\omega^{2}}{c^{2}} \right){H(r)}}} & (1)\end{matrix}$

 ∇·H(r)=∇·E(r)=0  (2) $\begin{matrix}{{{E(r)} = {\left( \frac{- {ic}}{\omega \quad {ɛ(r)}} \right){\nabla{\times {H(r)}}}}},} & (3)\end{matrix}$

where H and E are the macroscopic magnetic and electric fields,respectively, and ∈ is the scalar dielectric constant for the structure.To solve for the EM modes of such a structure, one solves the eigenvalueequation given by Eq. 1 (where H is the eigenfunction and 107 ²/c² isthe eigenvalue) subject to the divergence equation, Eq. 2, to give H.Thereafter, one can determine E from H according to Eq. 3.

Often symmetry can be used to simplify the solution. For example, withrespect to many of the particular example described herein, we mayassume continuous translational symmetry (i.e., a uniform cross-section)along its longitudinal axis, which we shall denote as the z-axis. Ofcourse, in practice the structures may have small deviations from suchuniformity. Moreover, the structures will have a finite spatial extent.Nonetheless, based on the assumption of a uniform cross-section for somelength that is large relative to the waveguide diameter, the EM modessupported by the waveguides can be written schematically asF(x,y,z)=exp[i(βz−ωt)]F(x,y), where F is any of the electromagneticfield components. The parameter β in the expression for F is thelongitudinal wavevector.

In the following sections we provide a more detailed analysis ofphotonic crystal fiber waveguide 100 and the parameters that lead tooptimal performance for long distance optical telecommunications. Theanalyses focus on a Bragg fiber arrangement, but the results and scalinglaws may be extended to large core photonic crystal fibers in general.

Hollow Dielectric vs. Metallic Waveguides

Insight into the principles of dielectric waveguide 100 may be achievedthrough analogy with a hollow metallic waveguides. FIG. 2 shows a hollowdielectric photonic crystal waveguide 200 having core radius R (leftpanel) contrasted with a hollow metallic waveguide 210 having a coreradius R (right panel). In dielectric waveguide 200, the hollow core(index of refraction unity) is surrounded by a multilayer confinementregion (hereinafter “cladding”) that includes of alternating layershaving high (dark) and low (light) indices of refraction. In thepresently described embodiment, the indices of refraction of thecladding layers are selected to be 4.6 and 1.6 and have thicknesses of0.33 a and 0.67 a, respectively, where a is the thickness of onehigh/low bilayer. Once a mode frequency ν is computed units of c/a,where c is the speed of light, the physical value of a is determined viaa=λ/ν for some desired operational wavelength λ. The radius R of thewaveguide will vary in the differing examples presented herein, forexample, from a minimum of 2 a to a maximum of 100 a. As we shall see,values of R greater than about 5 a (or even greater than 10 a or 20 a)have many advantages.

Metallic waveguide 210 has as that of hollow dielectric waveguide 200,but a metal cylinder replaces the multilayer dielectric cladding. In themetallic case, light is confined in the core by the impenetrability of anear-perfect metal (something that is practical nonexistent at opticalfrequencies). The confined modes for metallic waveguide 210 with R=2 aare depicted in FIG. 3 (right panel) for the lowest seven modes. Thedispersion relations shown in FIG. 3 depict two conserved quantities:the axial wavenumber, and the frequency ω. By symmetry, modes of acylindrical waveguide can also be labeled by their “angular momentum”integer m. For waveguides that lie along the z axis, the (z, t, φ)dependence of the modes is then given by: exp[i(βz−ωt+mφ)], where φ isthe azimuth coordinate for the cylinder. In the hollow metal tube, theeigenmodes are purely polarized as TM (H_(z)=0) or TE (E_(z)=0), and thel-th mode of a given m is labeled TX_(ml).

In the dielectric case, light is confined by the one-dimensionalphotonic band gap of the multi-layer cladding, which is easy to analyzein the limit as the cladding becomes planar. The resulting bandstructure is shown in the left panel of FIG. 3. The dark regions in theleft panel of FIG. 3 correspond to (β, ω) pairs for which light canpropagate in the within the mirror, whereas the white and gray regionscorrespond to situations where light cannot propagate in the mirror. Thethick black line in the left panel of FIG. 3 corresponds to the lightline (ω=cβ) and the gray regions correspond to frequency regions ofomnidirectional reflectivity for the mirror. For the planar dielectricmirror, β is the surface-parallel wavevector component. In the photonicgap regions (the white and gray regions), we expect the mirrors tobehave similarly to a metal, and confine modes strongly. Because everyeigenmode has a finite, conserved m, the effective wavevector k₁₀₀ =m/rin the φ direction goes to zero as r becomes large. If this were nottrue, there could be no band gaps in FIG. 3 because non-zero k₁₀₀ 195 βwould have to be projected on the Bragg band diagram. Notably, the Braggband diagram shows ranges of omnidirectional reflection (gray regions),which correspond to frequencies at which any incident wave from air arereflected by the planar mirrors (and vice versa). Omnidirectionalreflection per se is not strictly necessary for guidance in thesefibers, but its presence is strongly correlated with the regimes oflarge, polarization-independent gaps along the light line.

Bragg mirrors have different band-gaps for “TE” and “TM” polarizations,referring to fields purely parallel to the interface and fields with anormal component, respectively. (Both polarizations are shown in FIG. 3.Strictly speaking, this corresponds to the metallic waveguide TE and TMlabels only for m=0; all non-zero m modes have some nonzero E_(r)component.

The modes supported by any cylindrical waveguide, including metallicwaveguides, Bragg fibers, and conventional index-guided fibers, can becomputed by a transfer-matrix method in which the longitudinal fields(E{z} and H{z}) of a given (m, ω, β) in an annular region of index n_(j)are expanded in Bessel functions J_(m)(k_(j)r) and Y_(m)(k_(j)r), withk_(j)≡{square root over (n_(j) ²ω²/c²−β²)}. At each interface, thecoefficients are related by a 4×4 transfer matrix that matches boundaryconditions. The product of all these transfer matrices yields a singlematrix relating the fields in the core to those in the outermostcladding. Then, by application of appropriate boundary conditions, theβ_(n) wavevectors of the various modes can be found, as discussedfurther below.

For the moment, we are primarily interested in the modes that lie withinthe band gap of the one-dimensional Bragg mirrors. Such modes must decayexponentially with r in the cladding (i.e., confinement region), andtherefore are truly guided modes in the limit of infinitely manycladding layers (the case of finite layers is considered further below).Most of these modes lie above the ω=cβ light line, and thus propagatewithin the hollow core in much the same way as the modes of a metallicwaveguide. It is also possible, however, for modes to lie beneath thelight line and yet inside the band gap, in which case they are surfacestates localized around the core/cladding interface.

In FIG. 4, we show the first couple guided modes computed for a Braggfiber with core-radius R=2 a and the above-mentioned planar-mirrorparameters. The light-colored lines in FIG. 4 are for TE and HE modes,while the dark-colored lines are for TM and EH modes, and again thethick black line is the light line (ω=cβ). The dark solid regions inFIG. 4 represent the continuum of modes that propagate within themultilayer cladding. The guided modes are at nearly the same frequenciesas those for the guided modes of the metallic waveguide in FIG. 3(right-panel), with the one-dimensional bandgaps superimposed. In thedielectric waveguide, the modes are only purely TE and TM for m=0, butfor non-zero m they are strongly TE-like or TM-like, and are called HEand EH, respectively. Furthermore, when a mode enters the second gap, weadd a prime superscript. We also find that the guided modes in the Braggfiber have the same orthogonality relationships as those of the metallicwaveguide and conclude that their respective field patterns must also benearly identical.

Large Core Bragg Fibers

The above calculations yielded the modes of a Bragg fiber for a radiusR=2 a. This small radius has the advantage of supporting only a fewmodes, which are easy to plot and understand in their entirety and evenhas a single-mode frequency range. The analogy with metallic waveguides,however, indicates that this may not be the most desirable regime forfiber operation.

In metallic waveguides, the lowest-loss mode is TE₀₁, and its ohmiclosses decrease as 1/R³. Moreover, the differential losses between TE₀₁and other modes create a modal-filtering effect that allows thesemetallic waveguides to operate in an effectively single-mode fashion. Onthe other hand, for large core radii (high frequencies), losses becomedominated by scattering into other closely-spaced modes, especially intothe degenerate TM₁₁ mode via bends.

Similar results hold for OmniGuide fibers: the lowest-loss mode is TE₀₁and many of its losses fall off as 1/R³. Like the metallic waveguides,and unlike conventional index-guided optical fibers with their smallmaterial contrasts, we demonstrate a strong modal-filtering effect basedon the degree of confinement in the core. Also as before, inter-modalscattering worsens with increasing R.

Based on such considerations, and as demonstrated further below, we findthat a core radius in the range of about 5 a to 100 a (or even 7 a toabout 70 a, or even 10 a to about 50 a) leads to desirable results. Fora central wavelength λ in the middle of the frequencies guided by thewaveguide, these range may be approximately expresses as 2 λ<R<40 λ,with similar sub-ranges.

In the next couple sections, we focus on an embodiment of a Bragg fiberhaving a hollow core radius of R=30 a, and a confinement region having17 layers. The 17 layers start with a high-index layer of index 4.6 andalternate with a low-index layer of index 1.6. The thicknesses of thehigh-index and low-index layers are 0.22 a and 0.78 a, respectively. Thepoint of lowest TE₀₁ dissipation losses (which is discussed furtherbelow) then lies at a frequency of ω≅0.28·2πc/a, so if we make thiscorrespond to the standard λ=1.55 microns of telecommunications, we havea=0.434 microns. Equivalently, R=13.02=8.4 λ.

In order to choose the layer thicknesses of the confinement layers, weemploy an approximate quarter-wave condition. It is well-known that, fornormal incidence, a maximum band gap is obtained for a “quarter-wave”stack in which each layer has equal optical thickness λ/4, orequivalently d_(hi)/d_(lo)=n_(lo)/n_(hi), where d and n refer to thethickness and index, respectively, of the high-index and low-indexlayers. Normal incidence, however, corresponds to β=0, whereas for acylindrical waveguide the desired modes typically lie near the lightline ω=cβ (in the limit of large R, the lowest-order modes areessentially plane waves propagating along z-axis, i.e., the waveguideaxis). In this case, the quarter-wave condition becomes: $\begin{matrix}{\frac{d_{hi}}{d_{lo}} = \frac{\sqrt{n_{lo}^{2} - 1}}{\sqrt{n_{hi}^{2} - 1}}} & (4)\end{matrix}$

Strictly speaking, Equation (4) may not be exactly optimal because thequarter-wave condition is modified by the cylindrical geometry, whichmay require the optical thickness of each layer to vary smoothly withits radial coordinate. Nonetheless, we find that Eq. (4) provides anexcellent guideline for optimizing many desirable properties, especiallyfor core radii larger than the mid-gap wavelength.

As in the R=2 a case, the guided-modes of this R=30 a Bragg fiber can belabeled by analogy to the modes of an equal-radius metallic waveguide.Tranverse electric field profiles of two such modes in the Bragg fiber,the lowest-loss TE₀₁ and the linearly-polarized EH₁₁ (analogous mode tothe TM₁₁ in a metallic guide) are depicted in FIG. 5 for ω0.28(2πc/a)(which corresponds to β=0.27926(2πc/a) and β=0.27955(2πc/a) for the twomodes, respectively). The TE₀₁ mode is circularly symmetric and“azimuthally” polarized ({overscore (E)}⊥{circumflex over (φ)}). Thus,unlike the doubly-degenerate EH₁₁ mode (two orthogonal polarizations),cannot be split into two modes of differing velocities by fiberimperfections, and is therefore immune to polarization-mode dispersion(PMD). We note that the mode labeling in a Bragg fiber is more complexthan in a metallic waveguide, because sometimes a mode will cross thelight line and become a surface state localized around the core/claddinginterface. When that happens, another mode moves “up” and takes itsplace; for example, the TM₀₁ mode crosses the light line atω=0.27(2πc/a), while the TM₀₂ mode continuously takes on the core fieldpattern of TM₀₁. When in doubt, we label a mode as HE or EH dependingupon whether it is dominated by H_(z) or E_(z) at r=0, respectively, andnumber the core modes according to their ordering above the light line.

Scaling Laws with Core Size

Because of the strong reflectivity of the dielectric confinementmirrors, many of the mode properties are determined largely by thegeometric size R of the core, within which the modes are confined.Subsequently we derive scaling relations for the different quantitiescomputed, and in this section we lay the groundwork for thosederivations by presenting basic scalings of the fields and modes. Thesescaling relations are largely independent of details such as the preciseindex contrast that is used, so long as it is sufficiently large for themetallic analogy to hold, and will provide a broad understanding of theadvantages and tradeoffs of a Bragg fiber structure.

In particular, we will focus on the suppression of cladding phenomenafor the TE₀₁ (especially TE₀₁) modes of the fiber. A critical propertyof TE₀₁ modes is that, by analogy with a hollow metallic waveguide, theyhave a node in their electric field near r=R. It then follows that theamplitude of the electric field in the cladding is proportional to theslope of E_(φ) at R. The form of E_(φ) in the core, however, is simplythe Bessel function J₁(ξ/R), where ξ(ω) is roughly the 1-th zero of J₁.The slope at R is then (J₀(ξ)−J₂(ξ))(ξ/2R). Moreover, for thequarter-wave stack, the value of E_(φ) is maximized at near each of thehigh-index layer to low-index layer interfaces. Thus, not including anynormalization of the J₁ amplitude (i.e., E_(φ)˜1), we find that theunnormalized E_(φ) in the cladding scales as d_(hi)/R. In addition,typically we must normalize the power of the field: this means dividingthe electric field vector E by an additional factor proportional to thesquare root of the mode area, which is proportional to R. and so:$\begin{matrix}{{\text{normalized}\quad {TE}_{01}\quad \text{cladding}\quad \overset{\rightarrow}{E}} \propto \frac{1}{R^{2}}} & (5)\end{matrix}$

Moreover, the area of the field in the cladding is the perimeter (whichscales as R) times some constant (penetration depth) that depends on thesize of the of the band gap. Combining this with Eq. 5 gives:$\begin{matrix}{{\text{fraction~~of}\quad {\int{{{\overset{\rightarrow}{E}}^{2}}\quad \text{in~~cladding~~for}\quad {TE}_{01}}}} \propto \frac{1}{R^{3}}} & (6)\end{matrix}$

and from this we derive many other scaling relations. In contrast, forTM or mixed-polarization modes with an E_(r) component, the unnormalizedfield amplitude in the cladding remains roughly constant with changingR, thus their fractional energy density in the cladding then scales asonly 1/R, so the cladding has a much greater effect on them.

By general phase-space arguments, the total number of modes in the coremust scale as the area R². Moreover, in a metal waveguide, thedispersion relations look like β_(n)={square root over (ω²/c²−ξ_(n)²/R²)}, where An are roots or extrema of Bessel functions. Therefore,far from cutoff (R>>ξ_(n)c/ω), we have: $\begin{matrix}{{\text{mode~~separation}\quad \Delta \quad \beta} \propto \frac{1}{R^{2}}} & (7)\end{matrix}$

Unfortunately, Δβ can be somewhat more complicated in a Bragg fiber, dueto the finite field penetration into the cladding and due to thetransitions into surface states and subsequent mode relabelingsdiscussed earlier. For example, consider the case of the EH₁₁ mode,which is degenerate with TE₀₁ in the metallic limit. In the Bragg fiber,however, the degeneracy is broken by the penetration of the fields intothe cladding. Such degeneracy breaking can also be understood in termsof the phase shift of a TE/TM polarized wave upon reflection from thedielectric multilayer mirror, which induces a small shift Δβ: byperturbation theory, Δβ is proportional to the amount of EH₁₁ energy inthe cladding, which scales inversely with R: $\begin{matrix}{{{TE}_{01}\quad \text{and}\quad {EH}_{11}\quad \text{mode~~separation}\quad \Delta \quad \beta} \propto \frac{1}{R}} & (8)\end{matrix}$

Testing this scaling relation numerically for λ=1.55 microns, however,we find that this separation eventually scales as 1/R² for R greaterthan or equal to about 40 a. It turns out that the “fundamental” HE₁₁mode has crossed the light line to become a surface state, and EH₁₁continuously transitions to being more HE₁₁-like, thus scalingeventually as Eq. 7.

Leaky Modes and Radiation Loss

In the preceding discussion, we have neglected a point that may seemimportant: in reality, there will be only a finite number of claddinglayers in the confinement region. Because of this, and the fact that themodes of interest lie above the light line of the outermost region, thefield power will slowly leak out in a process akin to quantum-mechanical“tunneling.” This radiation loss, however, decreases exponentially withthe number of cladding layers, and we quantify its smallness explicitlybelow. We find that only a small number of layers is required to achieveleakage rates well below 0.1 dB/km. Moreover, the radiation leakagestrongly differs between modes, inducing a modal-filtering effect thatallows a large-core Bragg fiber to operate in an effectively single-modefashion.

In the limit of infinitely many cladding layers, the modes in theOmniGuide core are true confined modes, thanks to the band gap, withdiscrete real eigenvalues β_(n). For finitely many layers, modes are nolonger truly confined (above the outermost light line), leading to acontinuum of β values with infinitely-extended eigenstates. The formerconfined modes become leaky resonances: superpositions of real-βeigenmodes centered on β_(n) with a width Δβ proportional to theradiative decay rate α_(n). Such resonances can be studied directly viathe physical real-β continuum, but a powerful alternative method is theleaky-mode technique, which employs a conceptual analytic continuationfrom a real β to {tilde over (β)} in the complex plane to satisfy aboundary condition of zero incoming flux. The power decay rate α_(n) isthen given by 2Im{{tilde over (β)}_(n)}, where Im denotes the imaginarypart.

For the Bragg fiber, the leaky-mode method is as follows. Thetransfer-matrix formulation allows one to compute 2×2 matrices M_(m)^(±)(ω,β) that connect the TE and TM amplitudes at the origin to theamplitudes of the outgoing (+) or incoming (−) TE and TM cylindricalwaves (Hankel functions) in the outermost region, as a function of ω andβ for a given angular-momentum index m. For a leaky mode, we wish toimpose the boundary condition of zero incoming waves, so that there areno sources at infinity; such a solution exists whenever there is a zeroeigenvalue of M_(m) ⁻. Therefore, we use the determinant:

ƒ_(m)(ω,{tilde over (β)})≡det[M _(m) ⁻(ω,{tilde over (β)})]  (9)

so that the leaky mode is defined by ƒ_(m)(ω,{tilde over (β)}_(n))=0.Once {tilde over (β)}_(n) is found for a given ω, the correspondingeigenvector of M_(m) ⁻(ω,{tilde over (β)}_(n)) yields the requiredmixed-polarization amplitudes. With finitely many layers, the only realroots of ƒ_(m) lie below the light line of the outermost region. (Wenote that below the light line of the outermost region, theincoming-wave Hankel function instead becomes an exponentially-growingfunction, but its coefficient must be zero all the same.) Above thislight line, the incoming and outgoing flux are equal for real β,corresponding to steady-state standing-wave patterns. The smallimaginary part of {tilde over (β)}_(n) above the light line yields thepower decay rate α_(n)=2Im{{tilde over (β)}_(n)}.

For all modes, the radiative decay α_(n) decreases exponentially withincreasing numbers of cladding layers, thanks to the exponential decayof fields in the Bragg band gap, eventually to the point where otherlosses (e.g. absorption) dominate. At λ=1.55 microns for this structure,the TE losses decrease by a factor of about 10 per cladding bilayer andthe TM losses decrease by a factor of 5 per cladding bilayer. Because ofthe smaller TM band gap, the losses of mixed-polarization (non-zero m)modes are eventually dominated by their less-confined TM components. InFIG. 6, we display the computed radiation leakage rates α_(n) for the17-layer, R=30 a structure parametrized earlier corresponding to thelowest-loss TE₀₁ mode, the next-lowest loss TE₀₂ mode, and thelinearly-polarized EH₁₁ mode to typify mixed-polarization modes. Likethe absorption discussed later, these differential losses create amode-filtering effect that allows the TE₀₁ mode to operate aseffectively single-mode, even for large-core Bragg fibers. From FIG. 6,it is seen that with only 17 cladding layers the TE₀₁ mode has leakagerates well under 0.01 dB/km, and even EH₁₁ has decay lengths of meters.Thanks to these low losses, the modes can be treated as truly bound formost analyses (e.g. dispersion relations and perturbation theory), withthe leakage rates at most included as an independent loss term.

The radiation losses are proportional to the field amplitude |{rightarrow over (E)}²| in the cladding, which goes like 1/R⁴ for TE₀₁ fromEq. 5, multiplied by the surface area (which scales as R). Thus:$\begin{matrix}{{{{TE}_{01}\quad \text{radiation~~leakage}\quad \alpha} \propto \frac{1}{R^{3}}},} & (10)\end{matrix}$

which is the same as the scaling of TE₀₁ ohmic losses in a hollowmetallic waveguide. In contrast, because of their lack of a node nearthe boundary, TM and mixed-polarization radiation losses scale only as1/R.

Group-velocity Dispersion

Given a dispersion relation ω(β), one important quantity is thegroup-velocity dispersion D (the rate at which pulses spread),canonically defined as: $\begin{matrix}{D \equiv {{- \frac{\omega^{2}}{2\pi \quad c}}\quad \frac{d^{2}\beta}{d\quad \omega^{2}}}} & (11)\end{matrix}$

in units of ps/(nm.km): the pulse-spreading (ps) per km of propagationper nm of Δλ. The dispersion D and the group velocity v=dω/dβ computedexactly from the function ƒ of Eq. 9, which defines the dispersionrelation implicitly by ƒ(ω,β)=0.

We can also consider material dispersion (non-zero variations in n(ω))introduced by the cladding, but we find that this has a negligibleeffect (due to the small field penetration into the cladding). Forexample, assuming that the cladding has the same material dispersion assilica at 1.55 microns, the contribution of material dispersion is lessthan 0.1 ps/(nm.km} over most of the bandwidth. What remains is thewaveguide dispersion, which stems from the geometry of the core as wellas the variable penetrability of the cladding. The resulting dispersionas a function of wavelength is plotted in FIG. 7 for the TE₀₁ mode ofthe 17-layer Bragg fiber (solid line) and a hollow metallic waveguide ofthe same radius (lighter line and circles).

As we discuss in the next section, the practical implications ofdispersion in a Bragg fiber are quite different than in ordinary fibers,due to the absence of nonlinear effects. Because dispersion no longerinteracts with nonlinearities, it can in principle be completelycompensated after any distance of propagation, allowing one to put alldispersion compensation at the end of a fiber link, as well as totolerate higher dispersions. Conversely, operating at or near a point ofzero dispersion will no longer exacerbate four-wave mixing noise.

Another important consideration is the relative dispersion slope (RDS),as measured by (dD/dλ)/D; ideally this quantity is matched in anydispersion-compensation system. For the 17-layer Bragg fiber above, theRDS is around 0.0007 nm⁻¹. This is 15 to 30 times smaller than the RDSof contemporary TrueWave-RS™ (0.010 nm⁻¹) and LEAF™ (0.021 nm⁻¹) fibers,and smaller slopes are typically easier to achieve indispersion-compensating fibers.

Suppression of Absorption and Nonlinearities

In this section, we compute the effect of absorption losses andnonlinearities in the cladding materials of a Bragg fiber. We show thatthese effects are strongly suppressed for the TE₀₁ mode, allowing highlylossy and nonlinear materials to be employed, which greatly broadensone's choices for high-index materials. Moreover, we will see that thereis the potential of greatly surpassing even the properties of silicafibers.

Absorption and nonlinearites correspond to tiny shifts in Δ∈ in thedielectric constant of the materials, and can therefore be treated byperturbation theory. This common technique allows one to compute theshift Δβ due to a small perturbation, using only the unperturbed modes(computed earlier via the transfer matrices). For absorption losses(also possibly including Rayleigh scattering), Δ∈ is a small imaginarypart added to the dielectric constant ∈ to represent the(material-dependent) dissipation rate. Using a first-order perturbationanalysis, we calculate the losses of the TE₀₁, TE₀₂, and EH₁₁ modes inour 17-layer Bragg fiber example by assuming that the core is lossless,and that both the high and low-index cladding layers have the samematerial dissipation rate α₀ (which may be expressed in dB/m).Furthermore, we divide the computed dissipation rate α by α₀, yielding adimensionless, material-loss independent absorption suppressioncoefficient of the respective mode. This was done for each frequencyacross the band gap, and the results are plotted in FIG. 8. As one cansee, the cladding losses are suppressed by more than four orders ofmagnitude over most of the bandwidth for the TE₀₁, a result that one mayanticipate based on the scaling law of Eq. 6. Furthermore, the lossesfor the TE₀₁ are substantially smaller than those for the other modes,producing a mode-filtering effect that allows single-mode-likeoperation.

We now consider Kerr nonlinearities in the Bragg fiber. Suchnonlinearities cause the index n of the material to vary as a functionof electric-field strength: n′≡n+n₂|{right arrow over (E)}|², where n₂is the “nonlinear index coefficient” of the material(s). To first order,the resulting perturbation to the dielectric constant can be expressedas: Δ∈=2nn₂|{right arrow over (E)}|².

Kerr nonlinearities cause several problems in fiber systems:self/cross-phase modulation (SPM/XPM), where the energy at one frequencyshifts the β at the same/another frequency; and also four-wave mixing(FWM), in which energy at one frequency leaks into another frequency.SPM and XPM interact with dispersion to limit dispersion-compensationschemes, and FWM causes noise/crosstalk between channels. Our concernhere is not to compute these effects per se, but rather to define thelimits in which they may be neglected.

The strength of nonlinearities in a fiber is given by a nonlinearlengthscale L_(NL), defined as the inverse of the SPM phase shift Δβ;this is the lengthscale at which SPM and XPM become significant, andalso appears as a scaling coefficient in the FWM noise. L_(NL) isinversely proportional to the mode power P (to first order), so we canalso define a nonlinear strength γ≡1/PL_(NL)=Δβ/P, which is a powerindependent quantity proportional to the strength of nonlinear effectsin the waveguide. We use first-order perturbation theory to calculate γfor the TE₀₁ mode of our 17-layer Bragg fiber across the bandgap,assuming that each cladding layer has the same value of n₂. We thendivide those values γ by γ₀, which is the computed value for γ when weassume both the core and cladding have the n₂ nonlinearity. Theresulting values provide a dimensionless nonlinearity suppressionfactor, which is plotted in FIG. 10. The results show that the claddingnonlinearities are suppressed by more than eight orders of magnitudeover much of the bandwidth. Thus, the nonlinearities of the large coreBragg fiber will be dominated by the nonlinearities of air rather thanthose of the cladding, even for cladding materials thousands of timesmore nonlinear than silica. Because gases have Kerr constants almost1000 times weaker than that of silica and the core area in our 17-layerfiber is almost 10 times larger than the effective area of a typicalsilica fiber, our Bragg fiber has nonlinearities that are almost 10,000times weaker than those of conventional silica fibers.

Such low nonlinearities would open dramatically new areas for fiberoperation: for example, high powers, closely-spaced channels and/orlow/zero dispersion without regard for FWM. In particular, FWM noise isproportional to γ²/(Δβ²+α²), so even when the channel spacing is madevery small (Δβ approaching zero), small radiation/absorption losses α onthe order 0.01 dB/km are still sufficient to minimize FWM when γ issmall as it is here.

The results of FIGS. 8 and 9 follow directly from scaling laws as afunction of core radius R. In particular, the first-order perturbationresult involves an integrand proportional to the fraction of |{rightarrow over (E)}|² in the cladding, which scales as 1/R³ as seen in Eq.6, and thus we have: $\begin{matrix}{{{TE}_{01}\quad {cladding}\quad {absorption}} \propto {\frac{1}{R^{3}}.}} & (12)\end{matrix}$

This is a familiar result, since it is the same as the scaling as thatof ohmic dissipation losses in a hollow metallic waveguide. The scalingfor the nonlinear strength γ is found by similar arguments. Here,however, there is an additional factor of |{right arrow over (E)}|² fromthe nonlinear perturbation itself, which corresponds to a 1/R⁴ scalingfrom Eq. 5. As a result, the nonlinear strength γ scales as 1/R⁷. On theother hand, the nonlinear strength γ₀ when one adds nonlinearitiesscales inversely with the area R² as in an ordinary optical fiber, so:$\begin{matrix}{{{TE}_{01}\quad {cladding}\quad {nonlinearity}\quad \frac{\gamma}{\gamma_{0}}} \propto \frac{1}{R^{5}}} & (13)\end{matrix}$

It is because of these rapid 1/R³ and 1/R⁵ scalings that the claddingabsorption and nonlinearities can be suppressed so strongly for the TE₀₁mode in a large-core Bragg fiber. To demonstrate these scaling lawsexplicitly, we plot the absorption and nonlinear suppressioncoefficients for the TE₀₁ mode as a function of R in FIG, 10,superimposing the predicted scaling laws. Hollow squares/circles showthe computed values, and the solid lines display the values predicted bystarting from the 30 a value and applying the scaling laws.

Scaling Laws with Index Contrast

Although many of the previous computations assumed an index contrast of4.6/1.6, the same qualitative results hold for a wide range of indicesas long as the confinement remains strong. The index contrast manifestsitself in the decay rate of the field into the cladding, whichdetermines the characteristic penetration depth d_(p), and the analogywith the metallic waveguide remains valid when d_(p)<<R. Below, wederive scaling relations to predict how Bragg fiber properties vary withthe cladding indices (assuming d_(p)<<R).

In particular, with each bilayer of cladding, the fields decrease bysome attenuation factor κ(ω,β). For modes nearly on the light line,using “quarter-wave” bilayers according to Eq. 4, and defining ñ={squareroot over (n²−1)}, the mid-gap κ for TE/TM fields is: $\begin{matrix}{\kappa_{te} \cong \frac{{\overset{\sim}{n}}_{lo}}{{\overset{\sim}{n}}_{hi}}} & (14) \\{\kappa_{tm} \cong \frac{n_{lo}^{2}{\overset{\sim}{n}}_{lo}}{n_{hi}^{2}{\overset{\sim}{n}}_{hi}} > {\kappa_{te}.}} & (15)\end{matrix}$

The penetration depth d_(p) is then proportional to α/(1−κ²). Using theearlier scaling law from Eq. 6 and definingƒ_(hi)≡d_(hi)/α=ñ_(lo)/(ñ_(lo)+ñ_(hi)), we can further generalize Eq. 6to give: $\begin{matrix}{{{fraction}\quad {of}\quad {\int{{{\overset{\rightarrow}{E}}^{2}}{in}\quad {cladding}\quad {for}\quad {TE}_{01}}}} \propto {\frac{f_{hi}^{2}}{\left( {1 - \kappa_{te}^{2}} \right)}\frac{a^{3}}{R^{3}}}} & (16)\end{matrix}$

Similarly, Eqs. 12 and 13 can be further generalized, where we alsodefine ñ≡(n_(hi)−n_(lo))ƒ_(hi)+n_(lo): $\begin{matrix}{{{TE}_{01}\quad {cladding}\quad {absorption}} \propto {\frac{\overset{\_}{n}f_{hi}^{2}}{\left( {1 - \kappa_{te}^{2}} \right)}\frac{a^{3}}{R^{3}}}} & (17) \\{{{TE}_{01}\quad {cladding}\quad {nonlinearity}\quad \frac{\gamma}{\gamma_{0}}} \propto {\frac{\overset{\_}{n}f_{hi}^{4}}{\left( {1 - \kappa_{te}^{4}} \right)}\frac{a^{5}}{R^{5}}}} & (18)\end{matrix}$

The number of cladding layers required to achieve a given radiationleakage rate for TE or TM modes scales inversely with log (1/κ_(te)) orlog (1/κ_(tm)), respectively. So, for example, if one used indices of1.459/1.450, as may be common for doped silica layers, about 2000cladding layers are required to achieve the same TE radiation-leakagerates as in FIG. 6.

The bandwidth also varies with index contrast. One is limited by thesize of the TM gap along the light line, which for the quarter-wavestack of Eq. 4 is: $\begin{matrix}{\frac{{\Delta\omega}_{TM}}{\omega_{0}} = {\frac{4}{\pi}{\sin^{- 1}\left( \frac{{n_{hi}^{2}{\overset{\_}{n}}_{lo}} - {n_{lo}^{2}{\overset{\_}{n}}_{hi}}}{{n_{hi}^{2}{\overset{\_}{n}}_{lo}} + {n_{lo}^{2}{\overset{\_}{n}}_{hi}}} \right)}}} & (19)\end{matrix}$

where ω₀ is the mid-gap frequency: $\begin{matrix}{\omega_{0} = {\frac{{\overset{\_}{n}}_{lo} + {\overset{\_}{n}}_{hi}}{4{\overset{\_}{n}}_{lo}{\overset{\_}{n}}_{hi}} \cdot \frac{2\pi \quad c}{a}}} & (20)\end{matrix}$

Telecommunication Systems

The photonic crystal waveguides described herein may be used in opticaltelecommunications systems. FIG. 11 shows a schematic diagram of anoptical telecommunication system 1100 including a source node 1100 and adetection node 1120, which are coupled to one another by an opticaltransmission line 1130. The optical transmission line may include one ormore segments of transmission fiber 1132 and one or more segments ofdispersion compensation fiber 1134. Source node 1110 may be the originalsource of an optical signal directed along the transmission line or itmay be an intermediate node that redirects the optical signal totransmission line 1130, optically amplifies it, and/or electronicallydetects it and optically regenerates it. Furthermore, source node 1110may include components for multiplexing or demultiplexing multipleoptical signals at different wavelengths. Similarly, detector node 1120may be the final destination for the optical signal transmitted alongthe transmission line, or it may be an intermediate node that redirects,optically amplifies, and/or electrically detects and opticallyregenerates the optical signal. In addition, detector node 1120 may alsoinclude components for multiplexing or demultiplexing multiple opticalsignals at different wavelengths. The dispersion compensation fiber(s)may be positioned to pre-compensate, post-compensate, or inlinecompensate for dispersion in the optical signal caused by thetransmission fiber(s). Furthermore, the optical signal transmitted alongthe transmission line may be a WDM signal that includes multiple signalsat corresponding wavelengths. Suitable wavelengths for the systeminclude those within a range of about 1.2 microns to about 1.7 microns,which corresponds to many long-haul systems in use today, as well thosewithin a range of about 0.7 microns to about 0.9 microns, whichcorresponds to some metro systems currently being considered.

Because of their small losses and nonlinearities, the large corephotonic crystal fibers described herein may be used as the transmissionfiber in system 1100. Because the losses are small, the lengths of thetransmission line can be made larger as periodic amplification is lessnecessary. For example, the losses may be smaller than 1 dB/km, smallerthan 0.1 dB/km, or even smaller than 0.01 dB/km. Moreover, because FWMis reduced, WDM channel spacing in the fiber can be made smaller.Furthermore, large amounts of dispersion may be compensated bydispersion compensating fiber 1134 because the nonlinear length scalesare much smaller.

Coupling Issues

Finally, we briefly address coupling between the large core photoniccrystal fibers described herein and adjacent fibers and/or opticalsystems connected at their respective ends. Generally, the couplingefficiency between respective modes of fibers connected to one anotheris proportional to the degree to which a mode in the first fiberoverlaps spatially with a mode in the second fiber. In the photoniccrystal fibers described herein, the lowest-loss mode is typicallyassociated with the TE₀₁ mode. Accordingly, for applications where thephotonic crystal fiber has a long length, operating with the TE₀₁ modeis preferable. The TE₀₁ mode has an azimuthal symmetry and has anelectric field distribution that is maximized at a distance from thecore center. On the other hands, index-guided silica fibers usuallyoperate with the doubly degenerate HE₁₁ mode (which may correspond to,for example, linearly polarized light at the core center). Such a modemay not overlap well with the TE₀₁ mode, which has an azimuthal symmetryand has an electric field distribution that is maximized at a distancefrom the core center.

To facilitate coupling, either fiber may include a mode-coupling regionto optimize coupling between a first mode in a first fiber and a secondmode in a second fiber. For example, to couple an m=1 working mode froma photonic crystal fibers described herein to the HE₁₁ mode of silicaoptical fiber, the silica fiber may include a mode coupling region whoseindex cross-section changes with axial position to smoothly couple theworking mode to the HE₁₁ mode. In one example, the coupling region mayhave a hollow ring-shaped cross-section that index-guides light withinthe ring cross-section and subsequently fills in along the axialdirection to form a conventional optical fiber. The ring diameter andthickness would be selected to optimize coupling from the working mode,whose field distribution is maximized at some distance from the corecenter. In another example, the cross-section of the silica fiber in thecoupling region could be doped with impurities to optimize coupling,e.g., the doping could form a ring-shaped pattern. The doping patternwould gradually be phased out over the axial extent of the couplingregion. Furthermore, in other embodiments, it may be the photoniccrystal fiber that includes the coupling region with some axialvariation in refractive index cross-section.

A number of embodiments of the invention have been described.Nevertheless, it will be understood that various modifications may bemade without departing from the spirit and scope of the invention.Accordingly, other embodiments are within the scope of the followingclaims.

What is claimed is:
 1. An optical waveguide comprising: a dielectriccore region extending along a waveguide axis; and a dielectricconfinement region surrounding the core about the waveguide axis, theconfinement region comprising a photonic crystal structure having aphotonic band gap, the photonic crystal structure comprising alternatinglayers of at least two different dielectric materials surrounding thecore about the waveguide axis, wherein during operation the confinementregion guides EM radiation in at least a first range of frequencies topropagate along the waveguide axis, wherein the core has an averagerefractive index smaller than about 1.3 for a frequency in the firstrange of frequencies, wherein the core has a diameter in a range betweenabout 4 λ and 80 λ, wherein λ is a wavelength corresponding to a centralfrequency in the first frequency range, and wherein the dielectricconfinement region extends transversely from the core for at least adistance of about 6 λ.
 2. The waveguide of claim 1, wherein thedielectric confinement region extends transversely from the core for atleast a distance of about 10 λ.
 3. The waveguide of claim 1, wherein theaverage refractive index of the core is smaller than about 1.2 for afrequency in the first range of frequencies.
 4. The waveguide of claim1, wherein the average refractive index of the core is smaller thanabout 1.1 for a frequency in the first range of frequencies.
 5. Thewaveguide of claim 1, wherein the core comprises a gas.
 6. The waveguideof claim 1, wherein the first range of frequencies corresponds towavelengths in the range of about 1.2 microns to 1.7 microns.
 7. Thewaveguide of claim 1, wherein the first range of frequencies correspondsto wavelengths in the range of about 0.7 microns to 0.9 microns.
 8. Thewaveguide of claim 1, wherein the ratio of the bandwidth of the firstrange of frequencies and the central frequency and is at least about10%.
 9. The waveguide of claim 1, wherein the waveguide axis isstraight.
 10. The waveguide of claim 1, wherein the core has a circularcross-section.
 11. The waveguide of claim 1, wherein the core has ahexagonal cross-section.
 12. The waveguide of claim 1, wherein the corehas a rectangular cross-section.
 13. The waveguide of claim 1, whereinthe confinement region guides at least one mode to propagate along thewaveguide axis with radiative losses less than 0.1 dB/km for a frequencyin the first range of frequencies.
 14. The waveguide of claim 13,wherein the confinement region guides at least one mode to propagatealong the waveguide axis with radiative losses less than 0.01 dB/km fora frequency in the first range of frequencies.
 15. The waveguide ofclaim 13, wherein the mode is a TE mode.
 16. The waveguide of claim 1,wherein the waveguide supports a mode in which at least 99% of theaverage energy of the propagating EM radiation is in the core for afrequency in the first range of frequencies.
 17. The waveguide of claim16, wherein the mode is a TE mode.
 18. The waveguide of claim 1, whereinthe photonic bandgap is an omnidirectional photonic bandgap.
 19. Thewaveguide of claim 1, wherein the photonic bandgap is sufficient tocause EM radiation that is incident on the confinement region from thecore in the first frequency range and with any polarization to have areflectivity for a planar geometry that is greater than 95% for anglesof incidence ranging from 0% to at least 80%.
 20. The waveguide of claim1, wherein the confinement region comprises at least 12 pairs of thealternating layers.
 21. The waveguide of claim 1, wherein the waveguidesupports at least one mode propagating along the waveguide axis forwhich the confinement region comprises a sufficient number of pairs ofalternating layers to limit radiative losses of the mode to less than0.1 dB/km for a frequency in the first range of frequencies.
 22. Thewaveguide of claim 1, wherein the waveguide supports at least one modepropagating along the waveguide axis for which the confinement regioncomprises a sufficient number of pairs of alternating layers to limitradiative losses of the mode to less than 0.01 dB/km for a frequency inthe first range of frequencies.
 23. The waveguide of claim 1, whereinthe lower-index dielectric material comprises a polymer or a glass. 24.The waveguide of claim 1, wherein the higher-index dielectric materialcomprises germanium, tellurium, or a chalcogenide glass.
 25. Thewaveguide of claim 1, wherein the diameter of the core is in the rangeof about 8 λ and 80 λ.
 26. The waveguide of claim 1, wherein thediameter of the core is in the range of about 4 λ and 60 λ.
 27. Thewaveguide of claim 1, wherein the diameter of the core is in the rangeof about 5 λ and 60 λ.
 28. The waveguide of claim 1, wherein thediameter of the core is in the range of about 6 λ and 40 λ.
 29. Thewaveguide of claim 1, wherein the diameter of the core is in the rangeof about 8 λ and 40 λ.
 30. An optical telecommunications systemcomprising: a transmitter generating an optical signal; and the opticalwaveguide of claim 1 coupled at one end to the transmitter to carry theoptical signal, wherein the optical signal is at a frequency in thefirst frequency range.
 31. The system of claim 30, wherein the opticalwaveguide has a length greater than 30 km.
 32. The system of claim 31,further comprising an optical receiver coupled to the other end of theoptical waveguide to detect the optical signal.
 33. The system of claim31 further comprising an optical amplifier coupled to the other end ofthe optical waveguide to amplify the optical signal.
 34. The system ofclaim 31 further comprising an optical regenerator coupled to the otherend of the optical waveguide to regenerate the optical signal as anelectrical signal.
 35. The system of claim 31 further comprising adispersion compensation module coupled to the other end of the opticalwaveguide to introduce dispersion to the optical signal thatsubstantially cancels dispersion caused by the optical waveguide. 36.The system of claim 30, wherein the optical waveguide has a lengthgreater than 200 km.
 37. The system of claim 30, wherein the opticalwaveguide has a length greater than 500 km.
 38. The system of claim 30,wherein the optical signal is at a wavelength in the range of about 1.2microns to about 1.7 microns.
 39. The system of claim 30, wherein theoptical signal is at a wavelength in the range of about 0.7 microns toabout 0.9 microns.
 40. The system of claim 30, wherein the transmittergenerates multiple signals at different wavelengths, and wherein thedifferent wavelengths correspond to frequencies in the first frequencyrange.
 41. An optical waveguide comprising: a dielectric core regionextending along a waveguide axis; and a dielectric confinement regionsurrounding the core about the waveguide axis, the confinement regioncomprising alternating layers of at least two dielectric materialshaving different refractive indices, the alternating layers surroundingthe core about the waveguide axis, wherein during operation theconfinement region guides EM radiation in at least a first range offrequencies to propagate along the waveguide axis, wherein the core hasan average refractive index smaller than about 1.3 for a frequency inthe first range of frequencies, wherein the core has a diameter in arange between about 4 λ and 80 λ, wherein λ is a wavelengthcorresponding to a central frequency in the first frequency range, andwherein the dielectric confinement region extends transversely from thecore for at least a distance of about 6 λ, wherein the refractiveindices and thicknesses of at least some of the alternating dielectriclayers substantially satisfy the following equality:$\frac{d_{hi}}{d_{lo}} = \frac{\sqrt{n_{lo}^{2} - 1}}{\sqrt{n_{hi}^{2} - 1}}$

where d_(hi) and d_(lo) are the thicknesses of adjacent higher-index andlower-index layers, respectively, and n_(hi) and n_(lo) are therefractive indices of the adjacent higher-index and lower-index layers,respectively.
 42. An optical waveguide comprising: a dielectric coreregion extending along a waveguide axis; and a dielectric confinementregion surrounding the core about the waveguide axis, the confinementregion comprising a photonic crystal structure having a photonic bandgap, wherein during operation the confinement region guides EM radiationin at least a first range of frequencies to propagate alone the waveguide axis, wherein the core has an average refractive index smallerthan about 1.3 for a frequency in the first range of frequencies,wherein the core has a diameter in a range between about 4 λ and 80 λ,wherein λ is a wavelength corresponding to a central frequency in thefirst frequency range, and wherein the dielectric confinement regionextends transversely from the core for at least a distance of about 6 λ,wherein at least a first end of the waveguide includes a couplingsegment over which the refractive index cross-section is continuouslyvaried with respect to the waveguide axis.
 43. The waveguide of claim42, wherein the confinement region comprises at least two dielectricmaterials having different refractive indices.
 44. The waveguide ofclaim 43, wherein the ratio of the refractive index of the higher indexdielectric material to that of the lower index dielectric material isgreater than 1.1.
 45. The waveguide of claim 44, wherein the ratio ofthe refractive index of the higher index dielectric material to that ofthe lower index dielectric material is greater than 1.5.
 46. Thewaveguide of claim 45, wherein the ratio of the refractive index of thehigher index dielectric material to that of the lower index dielectricmaterial is greater than
 2. 47. The waveguide of claim 43, wherein theconfinement region comprises alternating layers of the two dielectricmaterial surrounding the core about the waveguide axis.
 48. Thewaveguide of claim 42 wherein the photonic crystal is a two-dimensionalphotonic crystal.
 49. The waveguide of claim 42 wherein the photoniccrystal is a one-dimensional photonic crystal.
 50. The waveguide ofclaim 42, wherein the refractive index cross-section is continuouslyvaried to alter the field profile of a working mode.
 51. An opticalwaveguide comprising: a dielectric core region extending along awaveguide axis; and a dielectric confinement region surrounding the coreabout the waveguide axis, the confinement region comprising a photoniccrystal structure having a photonic band gap, wherein during operationthe confinement region guides EM radiation in at least a first range offrequencies to propagate along the waveguide axis, wherein the core hasan average refractive index smaller than about 1.3 for a frequency inthe first range of frequencies, wherein the core has a diameter in arange between about 4 λ and 80 λ, wherein λ is a wavelengthcorresponding to a central frequency in the first frequency range, andwherein the dielectric confinement region extends transversely from thecore for at least a distance of about 6 λ, further comprising a secondwaveguide coupled to the first mentioned waveguide, wherein thecross-section of the second waveguide adjacent the first waveguidecomprises regions of doped silicon located to improve coupling of theworking mode into the second waveguide.
 52. An optical waveguidecomprising: a dielectric core region extending along a waveguide axis;and a dielectric confinement region surrounding the core about thewaveguide axis, the confinement region comprising a photonic crystalstructure having a photonic band gap, wherein during operation theconfinement region guides EM radiation in at least a first range offrequencies to propagate along the waveguide axis, wherein the core hasan average refractive index smaller than about 1.3 for a frequency inthe first range of frequencies, wherein the core has a diameter in arange between about 4 λ and 80 λ, wherein λ is a wavelengthcorresponding to a central frequency in the first frequency range, andwherein the dielectric confinement region extends transversely from thecore for at least a distance of about 6 λ. further comprising a secondwaveguide coupled to the first mentioned waveguide, wherein thecross-section of the second waveguide adjacent the first waveguidecomprises a hollow ring contacting the first waveguide to therebyimprove coupling of a working mode into the second waveguide.
 53. Anoptical waveguide comprising: a dielectric core region extending along awaveguide axis; and a dielectric confinement region comprisingalternating layers of at least two different dielectric materialssurrounding the core about the waveguide axis, the confinement regionhaving an average index greater than that of the core, wherein duringoperation the confinement region guides EM radiation in at least a firstrange of frequencies to propagate along the waveguide axis, wherein thecore has an average refractive index smaller than about 1.3 for afrequency in the first range of frequencies, wherein the core has adiameter in a range between about 4 λ and 80 λ, wherein λ is awavelength corresponding to a central frequency in the first frequencyrange, and wherein the dielectric confinement region extendstransversely from the core for at least a distance of about 6 λ.
 54. Thewaveguide of claim 53, wherein the dielectric confinement region extendstransversely from the core for at least a distance of about 10 λ. 55.The waveguide of claim 53, wherein the dielectric confinement regioncomprises at least two dielectric materials have refractive indices thatdiffer by at least 10%.
 56. The waveguide of claim 53, wherein the corea diameter in a range between about 6 λ and 60 λ.
 57. An opticalwaveguide comprising: a dielectric core region extending along awaveguide axis; and a dielectric confinement region surrounding the coreabout the waveguide axis, the confinement region comprising alternatinglayers of at least two dielectric two materials surrounding the coreabout the waveguide axis, the two dielectric materials having refractiveindices that differ by at least 10%, wherein during operation theconfinement region guides EM radiation in at least a first range offrequencies to propagate along the waveguide axis, wherein the core hasan average refractive index smaller than about 1.3 for a frequency inthe first range of frequencies, wherein the core has a diameter in arange between about 4 λ and 80 λ, wherein λ is a wavelengthcorresponding to a central frequency in the first frequency range, andwherein the dielectric confinement region extends transversely from thecore for at least a distance of about 6 λ.
 58. The waveguide of claim57, wherein the dielectric confinement region extends transversely fromthe core for at least a distance of about 10 λ.
 59. The waveguide ofclaim 57, wherein the core a diameter in a range between about 6 λ and60 λ.
 60. An optical waveguide comprising: a dielectric core regionextending along a waveguide axis; and a dielectric confinement regionsurrounding the core about the waveguide axis, the confinement regioncomprising at least 12 pairs of alternating layers of dielectricmaterial having different refractive indices, the layers sufficient toguide EM radiation in at least a first range of frequencies to propagatealong the waveguide axis, wherein the refractive indices of thealternating layers differ by at least 10% for a frequency in the firstrange of frequencies, wherein the pairs of alternating layers each havea thickness equal to about a, and wherein the core has a diameter in arange between about 10 a and 100 a.
 61. The waveguide of claim 60,wherein the core has an average refractive index smaller than about 1.3for a frequency in the first range of frequencies.
 62. The waveguide ofclaim 60, wherein the core diameter is in a range between about 20 a and100 a.